I grew up in New England, where wild cranberry bogs laced the salt marshes and domesticated versions were a significant commercial crop. Rather recently, I discovered that the American cranberry, Vaccinium macrocarpon, is quite easy to grow in Northwest gardens as well. Like their kin, blueberries, cranberries are beautiful, disease-resistant and loaded with antioxidants and vitamin C.

This beautiful, mannerly evergreen is a creeping shrublet that runs fairly quickly in moist acidic soils. Right now, a gardener would be hard pressed to find an inch of soil that doesn't fit that description, adding cranberries to the list of plants that tolerate our soggy winters with aplomb.

Happily for us, cranberries prefer acidic soils that are amply improved with organic matter. Almost any kind of organic material will do, but if you intend to eat your homegrown berries, then certified organic compost would be a wiser amendment than composted manures.

The best fruit definitely comes from crops planted in sunny areas, but even in light shade, the lacy runners will thread themselves into a handsome carpet of shining deep green. Fine textured and tidy looking, cranberry offers the same kind of waxy, bell-shaped flowers produced by its close cousins, huckleberries and blueberries.

Cranberries enjoy similar conditions as well, preferring a sunny spot in humus-rich soil. Like blueberries, cranberries thrive at the edges of soggy places and can tolerate seasonal flooding with ease once their roots are well established.

Thus, young cranberries are best planted in late winter or spring, so they can grow for an entire season before the periodic floods of winter arrive. Though commercial cranberry bogs are flooded each year, your plants won't need it.

Cranberry farmers flood their fields mainly to control bugs and diseases, but homegrown plants are rarely troubled as long as they get regular water in dry summers. Drip irrigation or a leaky hose placed in the beds and covered with several inches of loose, airy compost or mulch will help your cranberry plants grow quite happily.

The small, warm-pink flowers will arrive in late spring or early summer, followed by plump red berries in fall. It usually takes a couple of seasons for young cranberries to begin bearing heavily enough to count. That's because they need a full year of growth to produce a strong enough root system to support the considerable effort of flowering and fruiting.

Tart and tangy, cranberries keep well on the stem until the first frosts arrive and can be gathered in small amounts as needed.

In my youth, harvesters used wooden "rakes," which look like flat boxes with straight wooden teeth, to gather wild berries. The fat berries were caught in the box, while the slim stems and fine foliage slipped through.

When frost threatens, you can gather your remaining berries by hand and dry them (they taste like sour cherries) or keep them in the refrigerator for up to three weeks. You can also turn them into a very flavorful jam or jelly. As I soon discovered, ripe cranberries don't freeze very well, but luckily it is possible to make decent jam from mushy frozen ones.

Most cranberries grow no more than 6 inches high, though some kinds will reach 8 to 10 inches in good soil. In less optimal conditions, they tend to make an almost flat carpet only a few inches deep.

Since the spreading arms will cover a good bit of ground in time, you can space young plants as much as 2 feet apart. To keep weeds from infiltrating the areas you want covered, spread corn gluten meal evenly between the plants as soon as you plant them. This will encourage rapid growth while discouraging weed seeds from sprouting.

As your cranberry carpets spread, you can increase your crop by taking cuttings from the runners. These will strike roots most readily in March and April and also again in October and early November.

For best results, cut pieces of firm yet flexible (but not swishy) runners about 6 to 7 inches long. Remove the leaves from the bottom 2 inches of each piece and tuck an inch or so of the cut end into an open soil mix. To make this, combine a quart of potting soil with a cupful of coarse sand and a cupful of compost. Keep the cuttings evenly moist (the rain should take care of that part) and you'll have a lot of new plants in short order.

If you can't find cranberries locally, you can order them from several mail-order nurseries. Burnt Ridge Nursery & Orchards carries a fascinating assortment of edible shrubs and trees as well as two kinds of cranberries. 'Pilgrim' boasts dusky, purple-red fruits, while 'Stevens' is a self-fruitful variety with big fruit. Both are priced at $6 for a husky, well-rooted 4-inch pot, or $12 for a gallon.

One Green World, which offers a terrific assortment of unusual fruiting plants, sells a 6-inch, self-fertile 'Pilgrim' that is hardy to minus 30 degrees for $6.95 per plant, or $19.95 for a bundle of three sturdy-rooted plants.

Help the Hmong

Got extra perennials or dahlia tubers? Here's a splendid opportunity to help local flower farmers whose crops were demolished in the recent floods. In early November, many Hmong flower farmers lost all or most of their dahlia tubers to the raging waters.

Most of the Hmong farmers came to Washington in the 1980s as refugees from Laos. Coming from an ancient culture rich in cultural arts and agricultural skills, more than 250 Hmong families now sell lovely flowers, ristras and floral crafts at regional farmer's markets.

More than 70 Hmong farming families operate in King County alone, supplying Seattle's Pike Place Market and many local outlets as well. Without their stock plants, these families have no means of producing flowers for the coming season. Unless they get help, many of our regional flower growers are likely to lose their livelihood.

What can we do? Gardeners with dahlia tubers and perennial plants to spare can donate them to our regional flower farmers. To donate or ask any questions, contact Bee Cha, the WSU Immigrant Farmer Coordinator for the Small Farms Program.

Reach Bee Cha at: bee_cha@wsu.edu or bee.cha@metrokc.gov or call him at 206-205-3154.